Cotton
by Dr. Dee Da Dee
Summary: Karara and Chiroro have hitched a ride on the Garuru Platoon's space ship out of pure curiosity, and now the platoon is stuck with them. What's more, Chiroro seems to have developed an interest in a certain chubby hacker...
1. Chapter 1

Tororo frowned as he tugged a small towel further over his shoulders. He had found it in his room just before his platoon descended from the ship, and he was bloody glad he'd thought to take it with him. When Garuru said their next mission would involve surveilling a park in the middle of August, he hadn't expected this at all.

The park they had visited was in a small English Town, close to the city of Manchester. Tororo had of course heard the many rumours of the United Kingdom's notorious wet weather... but freezing, dark _and_ rainy... in what was supposed to be the hottest month of year! Of course, this only made his understanding of the mission much clearer. The people of the town still came and spent time in the park, playing sports, using the skate park and playing in the playground, proving that for such a recent generation of Pokopenians, they were as hard as nails. Their short mission was to find out why.

That didn't make enduring the weather any easier, however, and the chubby hacker only found himself distracted from his work by it.

While he had been internally ranting to himself, he was gently prodded on the shoulder. Turning slightly, he caught sight of a yellow tadpole he didn't recognise.

"Who are you...," he growled, slowly picking up the ray gun that lay on the damp grass beside him "and how did you get here?"

The tadpole raised her arms slightly in a jokey manner and grinned playfully.

"I'm Chiroro, and if you shoot me, I will not be happy"

Tororo frowned at her poor attempt to be humorous. What an annoying person... Chiroro, was it? Where had he heard that name before...

Oh god.

"Karara's sister" He mumbled under his breath, while raising an eye ridge at her in question.

Chiroro stared blankly, before resting her finger on her chin in an almost thoughtful manner and responding to the silent query.

"We came here on your ship! Karara wanted to, so I just came with her. She told me to hide, for some reason..."

"That's _probably_ because you were illegally hitchhiking" Tororo grunted sarcastically.

"Ah! That would be it. I just assumed we'd be allowed on board because we're Taruru's mates, you know?" She said this cheerfully, but that didn't hide the twinge of worry and guilt that flickered onto her features. Looking to change the subject, she found her saviour in the form of Tororo's laptop.

"Oh, you must be New Recruit Tororo!,"

"I prefer the term 'Buck Private' myse-"

"I was hoping to bump into you. I love computers, so I was wondering if I could watch what you do?"

Tororo frowned.

"I'll be dead quiet, I promise!"

Tororo opened his mouth to protest, but then realised that Chiroro had come to _him_ instead of the old man! This was confirmation that he was the better scientist... kinda. Well, in _his_ mind, at least.

Chiroro took his silence as a yes, and promptly sat down next to him, smiling at him in a friendly way the highlighted the fact that she looked almost nothing like her supposed twin sister, Karara. Tororo merely looked away from her, not even attempting to return the gesture, and returned to work.

His research on the Pokopenians in the park bore fruit almost immediately, and he was finding it all very interesting, albeit a little obvious. Logging the data and securely sending it to the main computer in the ship, Tororo felt almost _relieved_ that he would be out of this situation soon. Chiroro's unwavering gaze upon his work was beginning to get a little awkward.

He began to log the last of the data, before he was quickly distracted by a swishing sound, which turned out to be Chiroro's tail.

"What?" He grumbled, glaring at her from the side.

"Don't you see it?"

"What...?" Tororo asked, eyeing the data he'd recorded with suspicion.

"You could easily use that DNA code you recorded to grow stem cells, test them and find out exactly what causes the Pokopenians to deal with such crap weather""

What.

"Well, obviously... I thought you pointing out something _important_" He mumbled, trying to hide his surprise.

He hadn't expected her to actually pay attention, let alone know what the hell he was doing.

"Impressed?" She smirked, raising her eyebrow in a proud manner.

Yes.

"No... that's primary school science"

"Aww, come on, I did my homework, man!"

Tororo annoyance only increased at the idea of her swotting out just to see if she could catch him by surprise.

"Can you..._please_... let me concentrate...?" Tororo grumbled, grinding his teeth.

Chiroro went red and nodded, ducking her head a bit.

Tororo thankfully got back to work, trying his best to ignore Chiroro's existence, and get through the rest of his work so he could get away from this... enigma of a person.

Suddenly, his communicator went off, bizarrely enough, playing the chorus to 'Black Rock Shooter', which Tororo quickly answered out of embarrassment.

"B-Buck Private Tororo speaking... yes... yes, I've found out what I needed to. Yes... she's with me...," he glanced in exasperation at Chiroro, who was smirking at him, probably because of his choice of call tone, "...Ok, I'll be right there, sir... over" shutting off the communicator, Tororo shot an unreadable glare in Chiroro's direction.

"Am I in trouble?" Chiroro, looking just a little bit worried, although she did seem a lot quieter than before. Tororo sighed, deciding to take pity on the bothersome tadpole.

"Probably not, most likely it'll be your sister that will be reprimanded for giving you the wrong impression and technically leading you on" Chiroro brightened up significantly at this. Tororo only shook his head and walked off in the direction of his ship, letting Chiroro tag along behind him.

"...Nice ringtone"

"Shut up"

o0o0o

Upon reaching the ship, Chiroro was nearly bowled over by her twin sister running towards her at speed.

"Don't run off like that again!," she chided gently "Mum told us that we have to stick together at all times so nothing happens to us"

"I'm sorry, Karara" Chiroro replied, though she didn't look the least bit sorry.

Looking up, Karara noticed Tororo shuffling over to his platoon out of the corner of her eye.

"You are _such_ a nerd, Chiroro, I knew you'd go straight to Tororo" she smirked, sticking her tongue out at her red faced sister.

Garuru, who had been chatting via his in-ear communicator, chose the following moment of relative quiet to speak up.

"I have just had a word with headquarters, who put me through to Dobaba"

The girls grabbed onto each other, each of them looking genuinely now at the mention of their economically influential and apparently scary father.

"It seems he has decided that since we are on a call out period, only taking minor missions, the girls might as well stay with us for the time being. He knows they are in safe hands, and also believes it will provide the girls with experience in the military field"

Tororo began grumble in frustration, but was silenced by the relieved cheers from the twins.

"I totally thought we would be in trouble!" Karara giggled.

"W-what do you mean... 'we'?" Chiroro asked with a weak half-smile. Karara gave her an odd look.

"You wouldn't have let me accept _all _the blame, would you?"

Chiroro lowered her head at this. She _always_ stuck with her sister, no matter what, so she wasn't about to complain. Tororo actually frowned at this a bit. Karara was blatantly using Chiroro's love for her as a sister to benefit herself. Even as an arrogant little brat, he believed this was very cruel.

Realising that he was sympathising with the younger twin, he quickly changed the direction of his thoughts to something work related. It would be something he would need a lot of extra focus for, with two inexperienced girls running about.

**A/N**

**Old story is OLD. This is a tester chappie, and is very short cos it took A LOT of editing from the original to get where it is now. This is one of the two multi chapter stories I'm submitting as testers as I'm unsure whether I should continue them or not.**

**I realise there are many mistakes in this chapter, even though i did so much whittling down and editing, such as the HUGE amount of dialogue and the occasional overuse of some words/phrases AND the lack of 'pu pu pus' and 'aloha's' but I'm just starting XD**

**As you can probably tell, i have tweaked Chiroro's personality a bit from the last story, making her more of a tomboy, and a teensy bit of a brat, too XD**

**The place I am describing is my hometown of Macclesfield, and the park I am describing is known as 'West Park' or 'Westie'. Yes, the weather is genuine. I was inspired to write this on a day in august a year or two ago whjen it really was wet cold and dark. YEAH ENGLAND.**

**Long A/N is long. I wanna know if you think I should continue this, that is all, bai bai :3**


	2. Chapter 2

Upon return into the ship, Tororo made his way straight to his room; where he would continue his research. He was slightly on edge, but only because he was expecting two hyperactive and probably hormonal teenage girls to come crashing into his room for some reason or another. So when there was a knock on the door, he nearly jumped out of his skin in surprise.

"Come… in?" he essentially questioned the door, suspicious as to who was behind it.

To the tadpole's relief, it was Zoruru who entered the room.

"What kind of reaction to a knock on the door is that?"

Tororo slumped his shoulders in relief.

"Thank god it's only you…," he sighed "What do you want, Scraps?"

Zoruru chuckled at the hacker's obvious relief that it wasn't the two girls now staying with them, before pointing to his leg.

"I have a screw loose" he explained.

"What else is new?" Tororo replied, gathering the tools he used to work on the cyborg's metal side. Zoruru didn't even dignify the joke with an answer.

"The annoying green thing was running around after me, declaring some sort of 'undying love' for me and tackled me so hard that she managed to catch a screw on my leg and now it's loose"

Tororo nodded with a grin and beckoned him nearer so that he could inspect the leg. He knew of Karara's notorious and very infamous sporadic crushes, and was not surprised by this 'assault' in the slightest.

"You know, that 'thing' is the daughter of the most influential man on Keron" Tororo chuckled.

"I couldn't give less of a flying fuck if I tried" He replied as he watched Tororo re-attached the screw and reinforced it using some contraption Zoruru worryingly didn't know the name of; proof that he relied on Tororo to much for his maintenance. Not that the cyborg was bothered, or even aware of it.

Tororo eventually packed away his tools and nodded to Zoruru, letting him know he was allowed to leave, though he kept his eye on the assassin as he inspected the screw, encase he had somehow done something wrong. Not that he doubted himself.

"She'll get over you in about a week, I'd say" Tororo spoke up as Zoruru began to leave the room, referring to Karara.

"I should hope so. I'm afraid that if she stalks me for too long I'd just eventually chop her head off or something. THEN I'd be fucked" Zoruru replied, rolling his eye as he opened the door, before stepping back and furrowing his brow.

"Leave me alone, you bloody kids!" He hissed. A quiet chuckle could be heard after that.

"Don't worry Zoruru, it's only me, and I'm not here for you anyway" came the familiar, carefree sounding voice of Chiroro.

Zoruru side-stepped out of the door and comical sound of the ninjas running could be heard, as he must have spotted the other twin somewhere down the hallway. Chiroro took his place, and awkwardly knocked on the door despite her being in the room already.

"Sorry to disturb you, just wondered if I watch you work some more?" she asked.

Tororo was about to say no. How interesting was watching someone type crap onto a computer screen anyway? She was bound to get bored and start fidgeting or making conversation. But that was before he noticed her subtle body language change when the sound of her sister calling for her rang in the halls of the ship. Her hand had begun to inch towards the door, and she looked as if she suddenly felt unsafe in the halls, where her sister was loose. Tororo wasn't sure if he felt pity, or whether it was a gut reaction, but he slowly nodded his head.

"…Go on then… but be quiet, I won't appreciate being distracted" he mumbled.

Chiroro smiled, now visibly much more relaxed as she pushed the door shut behind her. She made her way over to the bed the hacker was sat on, but pulled out a stool from beneath a nearby desk, covered in all manner of beakers of chemicals, and watched from the side, which Tororo was secretly thankful for.

He tried to continue with his work; which was sorting out the data he had gathered the day before. He was trying so hard to concentrate, but he just couldn't. It wasn't that Chiroro was irritating him – she was sat as good as gold on that little stool, not making a sound and just watching contentedly. It was his natural inquisitiveness. He was curious as to how Chiroro could preach about how much she loved her sister, and how she would do anything for her, yet displayed such obviously contradictive body language, which made her seem, uncomfortable, annoyed or maybe even embarrassed when she was around her.

Of course, he wouldn't ask her. He was rather proud of his uncaring image; it made people stay away from him in the long run. Besides, as mentioned previously, he didn't want to start any conversation that would distract him.

"Needed to get away from your sister?"

His mouth had a mind of its own, it seemed.

Chiroro looked at him in confusion. She wondered why on earth the salmon hacker was suddenly interested in starting a conversation with her, and _about_ her no less. Judging by the expression on Tororo's face, he was thinking the exact same thing to himself.

"Oh no, it's nothing like that. I honestly just wanted to watch you work again" She replied in a way that told Tororo to drop the conversation, but his curiosity seemed to overpower every other conscious thought in his body.

"you looked pretty uncomfortable just then"

Chiroro didn't say anything, only raised her eye in question. Tororo suddenly felt put on the spot.

"You tell everyone that you love your sister, and you'd happily do anything for her, but your actions don't necessarily mirror those words" He continued, choosing his words carefully.

She frowned and looked down.

"Of course I love her. She's always there…" she mumbled, not quite ending her sentence.

"In my opinion, she's just using you" Tororo interrupted, before screaming at himself mentally at his absolute stupidity. He couldn't believe what he had just said. He smacked his forehead with his palm in embarrassment.

To his surprise, she only attempted a weak smile.

"It's ok," She said "I know… she does kind of use me… but it's ok. We're sisters; we have to be there for each other"

Tororo paused, not wanting to ask the next question but knew he would anyway.

"When was the last time she did anything for you? Has she ever actually done anything for you at all?"

She didn't reply, just furrowed her brows a little more as she continued to stare into her lap.

"I reckon you should just refuse to do what she says next time she asks you" He said.

She looked up at him with a torn look on her face.

"I… you wouldn't understand… I just can't" She said, voice becoming coarse, like she was holding back emotion.

"Why?" he asked, with as gentle a tone as he could muster. Chiroro took a deep, shaky breath before continuing.

"This is gonna sound so stupid… But I think I must have some irrational fear of people being angry with me or something… I get so worried about that happening, especially with Karara… if she hated me, I don't know what I'd do…"

Tororo frowned again, but was finally able to keep his mouth shut in favour of Chiroro regaining her composure. Chiroro just sat there for a while in silence, trying to control her slightly uneven breaths while Tororo watched her patiently.

"Is it weird?" She asked eventually. Tororo tilted his head slightly.

"No" he replied, simply.

"I feel pretty stupid and weak about it" She murmured. Tororo shook his head at her.

"You aren't weak, Chiroro. Take me as an example, I've basically been pretty negative towards you since I met you, and you've been brushing it off as if you weren't even aware I was doing it. You're pretty strong for just putting up with me. Most people either beat me up or just leave me alone when I act like that"

Chiroro looked up at him and smiled again.

"Thank you, but I can see how uncomfortable it is for you to try and be nice to me, you don't have to, you know"

Tororo wasn't quite sure how to respond to that. He just continued to watch her.

"But… the fact you even bothered to ask… it was really sweet of you"

Tororo went red and looked a little flustered.

"I was just curious"

Chiroro didn't reply, just continued to smile at him as she got up from her stool.

"I'll leave you to it, buck private" she said as she left the room.

Tororo just sat still for a minute or two before falling backwards onto his bed.

"Damn it, now she thinks I care or something! Why can't I just keep my stupid mouth shut?" He grumbled to himself, before sitting back up again and attempting to continue his work.

* * *

><p>Pretty soon, night fell, and Garuru realised that he needed to decide where the girls should sleep. Taruru had offered his room, which Karara had immediately rejected, as she thought it was wrong to sleep in the same room as the opposite sex unless you were romantically involved with them. Zoruru had disappeared 'mysteriously' not long after the discussion had begun, and Tororo was not about to volunteer his living space. In the end, Pururu put forward the idea of them sleeping in the control room with herself as the supervisor, as she personally didn't trust them in her room. Garuru agreed, not realising what an absolutely stupid idea it had been.<p>

o0o0o

Not used to the unfamiliar surroundings, Karara lay wide awake glaring at the ceiling with tired eyes. Glancing out of the corner of her eye to her right, she spotted her sister, who was curled up in a sleeping bag propped up slightly against one of the platoon member's stations, probably Zoruru's, sound asleep.

The green tadpole grumbled quietly before glancing to her left, thinking that maybe she could tell Pururu about her difficulty getting to sleep, only to find that she too was out for the count in her chair.

Karara whined groggily. She decided that no good would come out of just lying there wide awake, trying to force herself to sleep, so she stood out of her sleeping bag and rubbed her weary eyes. Shuffling around aimlessly, it wasn't long till she spotted a shiny thing at the front of the room. She approached it, in a trance like state because of her tiredness, to get a better look at it. It turned out to be a small control panel with a series of five buttons on it. They each had a little symbol on them, and were placed just below the words 'LOCK DOWN' in large, red text. Of course, Karara wouldn't be Karara if she didn't press one of them, and press one she did.

THUNK

Everyone in the room jumped out of their skin, the two who had been asleep having been woken up by the deafening sound.

"What the heck was that?" Chiroro groaned, shaking her head dizzily in a bid to wake herself up a little more.

"Karara-chan… you didn't… did you?" Pururu gasped, pointing at the control panel the green tadpole was stood next to.

"Um… maybe…" Karara replied guiltily.

"You've just quarantined someone's room you silly girl! Didn't you see the words 'lock down'?"

Karara gritted her teeth nervously, before rubbing her eyes and taking another look at the button she had pressed. It had Tororo's symbol on it.

"Looks like I put Tororo's room in lock down… oopsie" She admitted. Chiroro sat up at such a speed that it would have been comical if it hadn't been for the situation.

"Tororo's in trouble? We have to help him!" She cried. Karara would have poked fun at her sister's reaction, but even she realised how inappropriate that was at this time.

"Well, there's no use just standing here, we need to get to Tororo's room" Pururu instructed, leading the two groggy tadpoles out of the cockpit.

Upon reaching the hacker's room, they found that Taruru, Zoruru and Garuru were already stood around the door, having obviously reacted quicker than the girls.

"Tororo! Are you alright in there?" Taruru yelled at the door, before his voice was drowned out by the metal on metal sound of Zoruru's almost frantic knocking on the door, visibly worried for the young hacker.

"You two stop making such a racket. The door is internally sound proof; you wouldn't be able to hear a bomb go off in there. However, Tororo can hear all the noise you're making and probably has a splitting head ache about now" Garuru grumbled with a face like thunder, clearly not appreciating the midnight wake up call.

Pururu walked up through the group with a stethoscope and held it up to the door.

"Honestly, Pururu?" Taruru chuckled, incredibly still finding humour in the situation despite being woken up at two in the morning. Pururu simply glared at him with an exasperated look.

"Shut up Taruru, it's worth a try," She grumbled at him before turning her attention to the door. "Tororo? Tororo, can you hear me?"

Surprisingly enough, she could actually hear him through the earpieces of the stethoscope.

"YES I CAN FUCKING HEAR YOU!"

Pururu fell away from the door a second before putting the stethoscope back up against the door, and just caught the end of his rant about him having 'the biggest fucking headache to ever happen in the history in the universe'.

"I get it Tororo, you're very tired and don't appreciate the racket" Pururu replied, gently. She heard a faint sigh through the ear pieces.

"Can you negate the quarantine for me?" he asked, sounding very tired and fed up.

"We… don't know how to…" Pururu admitted sheepishly.

"That's what I thought…," Tororo mused "I'm not sure it would be easy to teach someone how to do it…" Pururu frowned at the response, but quickly came up with a response.

"Well, we could always request sergeant major-"

"I'll teach someone!" He growled.

Pururu smiled triumphantly, amused by Tororo's stubbornness, but stayed quiet and listened to Tororo's explanation.

"Got it?" he asked eventually. Head spinning, Pururu tried her hardest to remember everything Tororo had just said, and failed.

"I'm sorry Tororo, it's too early in the morning for me to take in that much information" She admitted.

Tororo huffed at her reaction and went silent. Pururu waited patiently.

"Get Chiroro over here" He asked finally.

"W-what? Chiroro? Why her?" She asked in utter disbelief.

"Just put her on whatever you can hear me through. She seems to be a pretty fast learner" He mumbled, sounding a little embarrassed. There was a short silence.

"Chiroro?"

"Just do it, yeah?"

Pururu shook her head to further show her disbelief before motioning for Chiroro to come over and handing her the stethoscope. Putting the earpieces in, she smirked as she heard his grumbles of defeat, but decided not to highlight it, he was in a bad enough mood as it was.

"Alright, Tororo, what do I need to do?" she asked, only letting a little bit of mirth show through her words

Listening to what Tororo had to say intently, Chiroro surprised even herself with how much she understood.

"It sounds boorish, but I'll give it a go" Chiroro sighed in a jokily pretentious way.

"My hero…" said Tororo, Voice dripping with sarcasm.

Chiroro chuckled before returning the stethoscope to Pururu and making her way back to the cockpit, Taruru and Karara following her curiously while the others stayed stood by the door to Tororo's room.

Once back by the control panel with the five buttons that Karara had been prodding at just minutes before, Chiroro only stood and stared at the front panel of the controls in wonder.

"…How do I open this?" She asked herself thoughtfully. She looked behind her to Taruru for guidance, only to watch him shrug his shoulders, which told her that he knew just as much as he did. In the end, Chiroro settled for simply prizing it open with her fingers. Waving her sore hands about, she eventually ducked into the panel and got to work, attempting all the instructions Tororo had reeled off to her.

Taruru and Karara looked on in silence, the latter of the two feeling absolutely awful for all the trouble she'd caused just by letting her curiosity get the better of her. Taruru was slightly worried about his childhood friend, who could very well electrocute herself or something if she did something wrong. He'd always know Chiroro was smart, but he wasn't sure mechanics was her thing.

It didn't take long for Chiroro to emerge again, bizarrely enough with a completely black face.

"Right, I think that's it" she said, rubbing her hands together, ready to be proud of herself if she'd actually done it right.

"What the hell was _in_ there, a chimney?" Karara asked, referring to Chiroro's face.

Chiroro wiped some of the blackness off her face and looked at it closely.

"It's not soot you fool, this isn't a steam train! I think it's oil… I remember being sprayed by something but I assumed it was water from the hydraulics…" she explained.

"Stop being smart already, shouldn't we check to see if what you did actually worked?" Taruru interrupted before running off back to Tororo's room, the girls following close behind.

Upon return to the room, the trio were relieved to see that the door had opened, Tororo slumped on the door frame having nearly fallen asleep again, the three elder frogs looking on at him and asking if he was alright. Taruru pushed through them all and nudged Tororo in the ribs with his foot.

"Tororo! Wake up! Chiroro _saved_ you, aren't you going to thank her?" Taruru said in a very overly dramatic way. Tororo grumbled at him in annoyance, however one look in Chiroro's direction set him off into a fit of laughter.

"Pu pu pu! What the hell were you doing in there, you're filthy! Pu pu pu!" He managed between his own peals of laughter.

"I'm sorry, but you didn't tell my how far you wanted me to turn that tube thing so I just assumed I should turn it all the way!" Chiroro complained.

"Pu pu. You imbecile. You're gonna help me fix it, you know"

Chiroro merely raised an eyebrow at him.

"You're welcome" She said sarcastically, before yawning and returning to the control room where they were staying, Karara and Pururu not far behind, the latter ranting to the former about 'not touching anything'.

Tororo smirked as he watched the rest of the platoon leave to return to their own rooms, before picking himself up, closing the door and flopping onto his bed to try and catch up on sleep for what little remained of that night.

**A/N**

**I finally posted another chapter to this story. The truth is, it was already written up when I posted the first chapter, I just thought that I was gonna abandon the story, but it seems one or two of you are interested in this, so I spent my entire morning typing this up at my grandma's house to classical guitar and opera music. Yeah.**

**This is the longest chapter I have ever written for anything ever. It's also longer than all of my one shots (this chapter is 3209 words long 8'D) aren't you proud of me?**

**Hope you like this, you gaiz. If you do, I might even write another chapter for it, WHO KNOWS.**

**So yeah, proof that I'm still alive. I've got other stuff I'm writing, including the first chapter to another story which I am NOT typing up now because my head is killing me and I need to keep an eye on my ninja dogs. Hopefully be writing more soon, bai gaiz :3**


	3. Chapter 3

Karara surprised herself with how much sleep she got. Twenty whole minutes according to Pururu, who had forced herself to stay awake for the night to keep an eye on the hyper active tadpole.

Pururu had finally fallen asleep herself not too long ago, and Karara had a sudden determination to prove to the nurse that she could be left unattended without touching or breaking anything. She had decided that she was a 'big girl' now. She and Chiroro had only hit the sixteen year milestone mere month ago, but to Karara, that was a very important milestone passed. If she was old enough to leave home and or get married, she was old enough to sit _still_ for a few minutes.

To stop herself doing something she'd regret, she focussed her attention on her sleeping sister, who was getting restless; a tell tale sign that she was about to wake up. She always had fun listening out for the end of whatever dream she was having, which she occasionally spoke aloud. Not today though, it seemed, as only muffled murmurs came from within her sleeping bag.

Chiroro suddenly sat bolt upright, whacked her forehead against the worktop she was situated by, and fell back down again. Karara just stared, wanting to laugh, and she would have done if it hadn't looked so painful. Letting out the tiniest of chuckles, she crawled over to her sister's side.

"Chiroro, are you ok?" she asked, a hint of worry showing in her voice.

There was a brief silence in which Chiroro just lay there with her face scrunched up. Eventually, she lifted her hand to her forehead with a quiet hiss of pain.

"Aggh... Bitch" She mumbled to herself.

"Hey! It wasn't MY fault!" Karara whined, thinking her sister was blaming her newly obtained head ache on her.

"I was talking about the work top, dumb ass" Chiroro replied, a pained grin on her face. She slowly sat up, making sure she was facing _away _from the table to avoid worsening her 'injury'

"Good morning, Chiroro" Pururu mumbled tiredly, having just woken up herself.

Chiroro, sure that she was asleep just moments ago was almost startled into banging the BACK of her head.

"H-hey..." she managed in return. There was a short silence that followed.

"Hey Pururu, I didn't touch anything! See? You can trust me!" Karara cried out suddenly.

"I was asleep for ten minutes, Karara" Pururu deadpanned in reply.

"You really are overestimating my sister's self control" Chiroro chuckled before receiving a curt slap to the back of her head.

"Crap..." Chiroro hissed, gripping onto her head again.

Pururu just shook her head and left the room, leaving the girls to their own devices. It was too early in the morning for her to listen to two early birds chatting for ages, probably unlikely to actually get up for a while. They were teenage girls after all. She was the same at their age. Hopefully, now they were both awake, chatting is ALL they would do, and refrain from causing trouble. Of course, she knew what a stupid thought that was, but she was honestly just too tired to care at this point.

She made her way into the living quarters of the ship – this included a living area, a kitchen and bizarrely enough, a gym – and collapsed on the two seater.

"...Is that my cue to escape?" asked Zoruru, who she hadn't noticed had actually been sat across from her the entire time on a different sofa. He was clearly eyeing the doorway, dreading the entrance of his new stalker.

"Fhnfh" Pururu replied, her face buried in a cushion, muffling her words. At this point, Tororo entered the room, making Zoruru jump out of his skin for a second. The chubby tadpole looked as tired as what Taruru would call 'a sleepy thing on sleep tablets'.

He sat down next to Zoruru, trying his damned hardest to keep his head upright, looking a little dazed.

"Couldn't sleep. Made a room f' the twins wiv a dimensional device I can't be bovvered explainin'... y' can thank m' later..." he managed to slur out before falling sideways onto Zoruru's lap, the cyborg's flesh hand shooting out to stop The tadpole's head landing on the sharp metal of his left leg. Rearranging him so that he held him in his arms, a bit like how you would cradle a baby, Zoruru stood up.

"Better take him to bed, Pururu. Be right back" He said, but then realised how pointless that had been, as Pururu had fallen asleep yet again, so he just left the room. He didn't even get halfway down the hall before he was ambushed by two tadpoles.

"Huh? What's up with Tororo?" Chiroro asked almost instantly, Worry clearly presented on her features.

"Don't worry about him, Zoruru will save him, won't you darling?" Karara smiled dreamily at the disturbed cyborg, who only sneered as he edged away from her.

"He's FINE. He didn't get any sleep is all," he explained "I'm taking him to his room"

"M' fine" Tororo mumbled, squirming weakly in a bid to be put down.

"Shut up" Zoruru ordered as he hitched up Tororo back into his original foetal position and continuing to the hacker's room, leaving the girls behind. Karara took in a deep breath and sighed.

"He's _so _Sweet, huh Chiroro?" She breathed, her eyes glazing over a bit, showing that she had drifted off into dreamland. Chiroro took a side glance at her and shrugged.

"If you say so"

Karara snapped out of her daze and pouted at her sister. This look soon changed into that of a puppy dog.

"You... _will_ help me win him over, right?" She asked quietly, trying as hard as possible to look pitiful. Chiroro looked fully at the shining eyes set into such an innocent and gormless face before heaving a long sigh.

"When have I ever refused?"

* * *

><p>Zoruru placed Tororo on his bed and put his hand on his hip, pointing down at the mattress.<p>

"Stay" he warned.

"G't t' work..." Tororo yawned, sitting up a bit and feeling around for his laptop, which he did find, but was quickly confiscated by Zoruru.

"I'm sure we can let you off this once" He said, with a slight edge to his voice, but Tororo could tell that he just wanted to help. However, that did not stop him from shooting a sleepy glare in his friend's direction.

"S'pposed to 'ncourage me" Tororo mumbled. Zoruru just placed his hand on Tororo's forehead and gently pushed him down.

"Sleep" Zoruru hissed in a way that, in his own way, sounded gentle.

Tororo appeared to obey, judging by the soft snoring sounds he began to produce after a short while. Zoruru rolled his eyes as he made his way to the door. Before opening the door, stole a glance back at Tororo's sleeping form, the tiniest hint of pink staining his cheek.

"S-stupid kid..." he grumbled before finally leaving the room. He walked into Chiroro almost immediately after doing so. She smiled at him in a very unnerving way.

"Hello, Zoruru" she said, simply enough.

"Wait... if you're here... that means Karara is lurking about somewhere, right?" He asked, not in the mood to be jumped at by a hormonal tadpole.

"That's right. If you let me go in see Tororo, I can tell you what hallway she's in, so you can go down the opposite one" She said, sounding like she genuinely wanted to help Zoruru, but had a look on her face akin to the one Tororo wore whenever he was either bribing or tricking someone. Chiroro appeared to be the mature one, or at least seemed that way in the short amount of time that Zoruru had known her, so he decided to trust her.

"...Go on then. If you wake him up, you're dead, I don't care about the social status of your family." He said, leaving the door open a crack.

Chiroro puffed her cheeks out a little at the threat, before smiling again.

"She's in the left corridor. So you should go right" Chiroro said. Zoruru gave her a very odd look for a second, before going down the hallway she suggested. She walked into Tororo's room, shutting the door quietly behind her.

"Sorry mate... I meant _my_ right..." she chuckled slightly. She really did feel sorry for the overly trusting cyborg. It was just that she liked this guaranteed to fail plan of her sister's. It meant that she had an excuse to go see Tororo. She wasn't one hundred per cent sure why she wanted to see Tororo that badly. Truthfully, she was quite worried about him, but like Zoruru had said, he was just in need of a long sleep. Speaking of which, she shifted her gaze over to the cubby hacker who had a passive grip on his pillow as he drooled in his sleep.

"Heh heh... Cuuuuuuuute..." Chiroro whispered before grabbing the stool she had used a day prior and sitting on it, watching over the salmon tadpole in silence.

"Now what do I do? I can't just sit here and stare, that's creepy," she whispered to herself "and who the heck am I talking to?"

She decided to listen out for what was going on in the hallway. She couldn't help chuckling a little at the sound of her sister running to Zoruru through the hall, the unmanly squeal that followed and the odd clanking sound of Zoruru legging it in the opposite direction. She heard what she assumed to be Karara leaping at the poor assassin, followed by a quiet slapping sound. Probably Zoruru's immediate reflex. Karara must have been slapped by seven previous crushes already, Chiroro was used to it. But Karara wasn't. She cried out rather loudly, Zoruru spluttering something akin to 'I'm sorry' and 'shut up'. At this point, Garuru could be heard shouting something, followed by Karara declaring her 'undying love' for him.

Chiroro shook her head slowly. Poor Garuru. It seemed age didn't matter to Karara at all – Garuru was definitely old enough to be her dad. Maybe even her granddad at a push. Ah well. She didn't have to worry about that right now. She had the sleeping hacker to worry about. She still didn't see why she freaked out at every small thing that happened to him. It seemed to her that she wanted Tororo to teach her things so badly that she had begun to worry whenever he showed signs of being unable to do so. Either that or... she just wanted to sit with him.

In the end, she was so absorbed in her thoughts that she ended up falling asleep, too.

* * *

><p>Much later in the day, Zoruru decided to come out of the meditative state he had put himself in a couple of hours ago and go to check on Tororo. He hoped that the yellow tadpole <em>hadn't <em>woken him up. He would be pissed if she had.

Upon opening the door, he was met with the sight of Tororo, still out for the count, which was good. Turning his head a little to the left, he was met with one of the most bizarre scenes he had seen in a while.

Chiroro was sat _on her head_ with her back to a stool, her backside in the air and her legs akimbo. She must have fallen asleep on the stool and eventually just lost her balance and fallen off it in her unconscious state. How that hadn't woken her up, he would never know.

He was about to turn and leave, but then he noticed that one of Chiroro's legs was sliding off the stool... slowly... slowly... until she finally kneed herself in the face.

"For god's sake. Not again. Ow..." She grumbled, sitting up and rubbing her sore head. She didn't even know Zoruru was there until she heard his husky laugh.

"Shut up" she said.

"I didn't say anything!" Zoruru answered back, his hands up in mock submission. Chiroro only rolled her eyes at him before looking back to Tororo.

"He's still asleep?" Chiroro murmured worriedly.

"Come on, leave him be. He could do with a little extra sleep. It's not like he gets much sleep on normal days either" Zoruru said, beckoning to the door. Chiroro nodded and came out of the room alongside Zoruru before running off somewhere. Probably off to find that love sick sister of hers.

Why was she so interested in Tororo anyway, he wondered. He knew that she was hoping to get him to teach her things about his work, but it seemed to be more than that. She seemed to enjoy his company. Maybe she just wanted to make friends?

He wasn't sure Tororo really liked being around people with that kind of personality, but hey, there's a first time for everything, he supposed. He decided not to dwell on it, and instead made his way down the corridors to Garuru's office. He wanted to make sure that Karara hadn't broken in and molested him or something.

* * *

><p>Many hours later, Tororo finally awoke from his deep sleep. He had a bit of a head ache and was slightly disorientated, not entirely sure of the time. He was also a little creeped out at the sight of the stool he usually kept tucked under a work desk at the side of the room <em>right<em> next to his bed. However, he quickly deduced that someone had probably sat with him while he slept. Probably Chiroro. It was she had sat the day before, after all. But he didn't quite understand _why_ she would be there. He did vaguely remember that she had been rather worried about how tired he was. He must have looked absolutely _awful_.

Hang on. He still had his previous theory that Chiroro was very uncomfortable around her sister, and seemed to be trying her damned hardest to stay away from her. So she came to him... because she thought he cared. If that were true, why hadn't she woken him up?

He groaned and held his head in his hands. He'd only just woken up, for crying out loud, and he was already thinking too much. He sat there for a moment, just sorting through his thoughts and trying to find the one with the highest priority. There it was.

"Foooooooooooood..." he moaned hungrily, climbing out of bed.

Swaggering with fatigue, he made his way to the kitchen for a midnight snack, if the clock on the wall was anything to go by.

As he was eating the sandwich he'd made using the leftovers of every meal from the past three days, he realised that he hadn't actually pointed out where the new room he'd created for the twins was situated. He decided that he would go and check it... who knows, the two of them may have found the right room while he was asleep.

Upon entering the room, he discovered that he was correct. The girls seemed to have picked a side of the room each and just collapsed onto the beds in fatigue. Tororo could tell because the lights were still on, and they were only activated by definitive walking movements sensed by the floor. Just a little added extra he'd thought of whilst making it. Also, Karara appeared to be face down and sprawled out the way she must have landed. Knowing what a light sleeper she is, if she'd been asleep for a while, she would have moved by now.

Glancing over to the right hand side of the room; Chiroro's side, he couldn't help a small smile. She looked kind of cute, half curled up in a crescent shape, her tongue sticking out and her brows slightly furrowed, as if she was concentrating on something.

He suddenly realised that he was staring at her and hastily left the room for fear of being caught doing so.

Unsure of what just happened, quickly made his way back to his own room and sat down, trying to calm his hammering heart. Staring into space, he frowned to himself.

"Am I supposed to sleep, now?"

**A/N**

**Whaaaaaat is thiiiiisssss. Another chappie, mebbe? And so quickly, too! I just need to try and stay out of my writers block and continue writing this thing, cos people seem to be enjoying it O.o SORRY, I put in a bit of suggested ZoruToro, but but but it wasn't meant to be X/3 It's still a ToroChiro, gaiz :3**

**This was an odd chappie, mainly because I didn't know what the heck to write, because this fic will definitely lack action for the most part XD**

**Also, it was quite a bit shorter than the last one, but can you blame me? that last one was quite long XD **

**((no offense to Garuru, but if Giroro Keroro and Dororo are all in their mid forties, Garuru must nearly be sixty! That's what I was getting at for the 'he could be her grandfather' bit))**

**I think I was gonna write something else but I forgot. Enjoy this impossibly quick update while it lasts XDD**


	4. Chapter 4

The next day, Tororo was jolted awake by a hell of a lot of noise, followed by a startled yelp and a few pairs of feet legging it through the hall directly outside his room. Rubbing his eyes sleepily, he groaned to himself. How many hours of sleep had he gotten last night… two? Maybe three? He wasn't really in the mood for this.

Stomping out of his room, he was about to yell at whoever was out there, but stopped when he was met with a very torn looking Taruru tightly gripping on to a very grumpy looking Garuru's shoulder, as if to stop him running off.

"Just let them go, leader, they didn't mean any harm, really" Taruru pleaded. Garuru let out a very heavy sigh before shrugging out of Taruru's grasp and practically stomped away from him in the direction of his living quarters. Tororo let a brief moment of silence ensue before saying anything.

"What on Keron just happened?"

"Karara happened, of course" Taruru replied, smiling in an exasperated way.

"What has she done now?" Tororo asked, more curious than fed up now.

"I'll give you the abridged version: She woke him up. Never a good thing, obviously, but she didn't know that" Taruru explained lamely, shuddering as he remembered the one time he himself had tried to rouse Garuru from his slumber. Being thrown across the room was quite an experience for him.

"He did look pretty pissed. Did she _molest_ him awake or something?" Tororo asked, scratching the back of his head nonchalantly.

"Well, she _tried_. If you call kissing someone good morning molestation"

Tororo chuckled and shook his head.

"Poor guy"

Taruru was going to reply when he was interrupted by Karara and Chiroro popping out from around the corner simultaneously.

"I-is he gone?" Chiroro asked, looking around nervously.

"He's so _feisty_! I love it!" Karara smiled blissfully, as if unaware that she had nearly been killed by the lieutenant's wrath.

"Yeah, I'm pretty sure Leader doesn't appreciate being woken up by a child less than half his age forcing herself on him" Tororo deadpanned, rolling his eyes.

"Hey I'm not a kid; I'm only like two years younger than you! And I could tell he did like it _really_"

Now it was Chiroro's turn to roll her eyes.

"Karara, he tried to _strangle_ you. It was terrifying! Not exactly the most pleased reaction in the world…" She stated, the last sentence tinged with sarcasm.

"But I _did_ save you…" Taruru added, not so secretly hoping that Karara would give him some attention. After all, it was pretty obvious that he had a crush on her. To everyone other than her, of course.

"Yeah yeah, whatever. I wasn't in any danger whatsoever. Which is why I'm gonna try again later!" Karara said with a confident smile, completely missing the disappointed look on the blue frog's face. Grabbing her sister's hand, she sped off down the hall for god knows what reason.

Tororo watched them with a bemused expression, before turning back to Taruru, who looked so dejected it was almost comical.

"You could try being more forward, instead of beating around the bush" Tororo suggested. Taruru sighed in response.

"We've been friends since we were babies. We literally grew up together, it's not quite that easy for me," He frowned "Anyway, since when were you a romance expert?" he added, raising an eyebrow.

"Pu pu pu, since never, clearly," Tororo laughed "I'm only suggesting the obvious; like being patient and never giving up if you really love her and stuff"

Taruru did look a little disturbed at that last part.

"Ok… I'll have to keep that in mind…" he said as he slowly made his way down the hall and away from Tororo, eying him suspiciously as he went.

Truthfully, even Tororo himself was a little creeped out about what he just said. He wasn't sure where he had got those suggestions from. He sounded like one of those people who wrote the problem pages for teenage girl's magazines. Not that he'd read any, or course.

"Fuck this, I'm hungry" Tororo said aloud to himself, snapping himself out of his thoughts and turning around, shuffling towards the kitchen. When he got there, only Zoruru and Chiroro were at the table eating. Tororo took note of the second bowl, half filled with breakfast cereal, directly by Chiroro's side.

"I didn't think you were a _glutton_, Chiroro" He said, his eyebrow slightly raised at he started preparing his own breakfast on the work top. Chiroro looked at him questioningly before realising he was referring to extra bowl she had and blushing.

"H-hey, this isn't mine! It was Karara's, but she ran off somewhere a couple of minutes ago and left it here," She cried "It's not like you can talk, is it?" she added, gesturing the giant buffet of a breakfast that Tororo had just sat down with. Tororo only rolled his eyes and started digging in, Zoruru watching him with a furrowed brow.

"You _will_ get fat one day, punk. It's not healthy" He grumbled at him.

"Whatever, _mum_," Tororo replied sarcastically "I'm clearly a bottomless pit, I'm not getting fat any time soon" He punctuated this last sentence by chomping at a huge clump of bacon with a loud 'nom'.

"Fatty bum" Pururu chimed as she walked into the room, affectionately pinching at the excess fat on his hip.

"Puwuwu!" Tororo groaned through his food stuffed face, laying his hand protectively over his exposed love handle almost protectively.

Chiroro stood up suddenly, looking as if she'd just remembered something.

"What's up, Chiroro?" Pururu asked as she placed her salad on the table.

"Karara's been gone for a while now, she might have gotten herself in trouble" She stated.

"She's only been gone about five minutes" Zoruru pointed out.

"This is my sister we're talking about. She doesn't NEED five minutes" Chiroro replied, leaving the kitchen.

"I'll go with her" Pururu said before leaving her salad so close to Tororo's plate it was almost on top of it. If _that_ wasn't a hint, he didn't know what was.

After a few moments of uneventful silence, Zoruru gave Tororo a curious look.

"Well? Aren't you going to follow them?" he asked. Tororo looked at him, his brows furrowed slightly in confusion.

"Was I supposed to?" he asked.

"Nooo… I just thought you would. You seem quite… attached to her" he replied, raising his eyebrow. He grinned at Tororo's rapidly reddening face.

"W-what are you getting at, Scraps?" he huffed rhetorically, trying to seem indifferent. Zoruru only shrugged before leaving the table, allowing Tororo to finally eat in peace.

* * *

><p>"Karara! Karara, where are you?" Chiroro called out worriedly, hoping that Karara hadn't gotten lost in the many twists and turns of the hallways within the base. She was vaguely aware that Pururu had caught up to her at one point, and could hear her calling for Karara along with her.<p>

Spotting Garuru's office, Chiroro made a beeline for it. She had a feeling Karara had gone back to have another go at 'winning him over' by herself.

As she and Pururu entered the room, they were met with a rather peculiar sight.

Garuru was sat behind his desk, a pile of paperwork laid out in front of him, but rather than concentrating on them, he was glaring across the room at Karara, who wasn't too far at the door. She was staring right back at him, in a startled, deer in car headlights kind of way. They were completely unmoving, as if the first person to budge would lose this very odd staring contest. Chiroro had to wonder just how long they had been frozen like that.

Sensing the presence of her sister, Karara appeared to crumble and scampered towards her and Pururu.

"Sis, he's freaking me out! Why didn't you follow me and _help?_" She complained, fixing Chiroro with a death glare.

"I-I was eating…?" she answered, almost in a question.

Karara was about to retort when Garuru placed his hands on his desk roughly to gain their attention.

"Leave. Now." He did not sound happy.

Pururu and the twins promptly left the room as they were told, walking silently, albeit quickly away from the office.

"Thanks for helping me back there, Pururu!" Karara gushed just as they rounded the nearest corner, taking both of her hands and gazing at her in admiration. Pururu looked very confused, and a little uncomfortable under the intense stare of the green tadpole.

"Oh god, no way" Chiroro mumbled, trying as hard as possible to stifle a disbelieving chuckle, but failing to hide a smirk.

Karara whipped her head around and glared at her.

"Just what are you suggesting, Chiroro? You're so gross!" She frowned, angry again, letting go of Pururu's hands so she could turn around to glare at Chiroro. The yellow tadpole recoiled a little under her sister's glare, wondering if she would actually do something to her.

As luck would have it, Tororo rounded the corner into their section of the hall, having just finished his massive breakfast. He stopped when he spotted the three females stood at the other end of the hallway.

"Hey… what's going on here?" he asked as he approached them, sensing the almost violent atmosphere. No sooner had he finished his question, Pururu began hastily explaining what had gone down in Garuru's office, effectively stopping Karara from garbling nonsense at him in her anger. It didn't stop her from glaring at her sister, though.

"I just don't see why you're so _mad_ at me! I didn't do anything!" Chiroro said to her sister, having eventually cracked under her unwavering stare. Karara merely huffed and narrowed her eyes.

Then Tororo said something he would soon regret.

"I would imagine she's a bit embarrassed or nervous or something. People snap under pressure" he pointed out.

A brief moment of silence passed, before Karara turned to him, a bright blush on her face.

"T-Tororo…" she breathed. He looked at her oddly, not liking the way she said his name.

"…Yeah?"

Suddenly, she ran at him and threw her arms around his neck.

"You _saved _me, my love!" she cried.

Oh no.

"Pu… pu pu…" Tororo laughed nervously as his body stiffened, not enjoying having his personal space invaded one bit. He stared desperately up at Pururu and Chiroro, the former smirking, clearly finding this hilarious for some reason. Chiroro however, she was just staring blankly back at him.

Tororo was suddenly aware that he was being suffocated, so he awkwardly ducked out of Karara's embrace.

"Pu pu… funny thing… I just remembered that I have a hell of a lot of work to do…very important stuff, mustn't be disturbed … er… bye!" he said before running as fast as his chubby little legs could carry him out of sight. Which was actually pretty fast.

"Hey, come back! I'm not done thanking you, yet!" Karara cried as she attempted to follow the path he'd taken.

The hallway was suddenly rather quiet. Pururu glanced down, a little curious as to why Chiroro hadn't run after her sister like usual. This was the second time today.

"Are you alright, Chiroro?" she asked. Chiroro snapped out of her daze and turned her head to look at her. She noticed that Pururu's face looked less white than usual, but didn't comment on it.

"Of course I'm fine" She said, so quickly that Pururu became suspicious. She glanced down the hall for a moment before raising an eyebrow in question.

"Is this about… Tororo?" she asked, failing to hold back a small grin.

Chiroro visibly paled, and began to try her damned hardest to change the subject. Looking around frantically, she spotted her saviour in the form of a small, cloth like mound on the floor. It had what looked like a decorative pink triangle on it, so she assumed it was a handkerchief.

"H-hey, I think you dropped something" she said quickly before going over to pick it up. Pururu chuckled at her obvious avoidance of the question.

"Now, don't try to change the… the…" she trailed off.

Chiroro wasn't holding a hankie.

She was holding a tadpole tail.

Saved by the metamorphosis, it seemed.

"N-no… NO!" Pururu gasped, blatantly groping at her own backside, hoping to god it wasn't her tail, although there wasn't really any denying it.

Giving in, she shakily reached under her hat and pulled out a little pocket mirror, looking into it before crushing it in her palm. The white patch on her face had receded, too.

Chiroro decided that this distraction was going very wrong, very quickly, so she legged it down the hall, Pururu's beloved tail clutched in her hand to protect it for her.

She ran to the first place that came to mind – Tororo's room. Using her empty hand, she pummelled his door.

"Let me in!" She cried, half expecting Pururu to have suddenly turned into a serial killer, and start looking specifically for her first.

"Get lost!" Tororo called back. Chiroro was confused and hurt for a second, before she remembered her sister's sudden proclamation of love not too long ago.

"Karara isn't with me! We were arguing, remember? Please let me in!" She answered back.

Hearing the obvious desperation in her voice, Tororo finally opened his door, Chiroro nearly crashing into him as she ran into his room to enable him to close the door faster. Tororo turned and gave Chiroro a look, raising his eyebrow in mild amusement.

"What's up with you? You looked as if you were fearing for your life just then, pu pu!" he chuckled, waiting patiently for Chiroro to regain control of her breathing so that she could answer him. It seemed she was having trouble however, so she just held up Pururu's tail. Tororo said nothing as he came towards her and gently took it off her.

"What kind of elaborate prank is this?" he asked disbelievingly, inspecting the tail in the light of one of the many office lamps littering the work tables in his room.

"It's not a prank, it's the real deal! Honestly, it was just there on the floor. I thought it was a hankie so I went to get it for her" Chiroro explained, sitting on the floor to rest her legs.

"I'll bet she's on a mission now, eh? You'd better lay low in here for a while then. Can't have you getting stabbed to death with one of her myriad of needles" Tororo replied.

She smiled and thanked him as she got up to have a closer look at the tail herself.

* * *

><p>Later on, when Chiroro was confident that the 'storm' was mostly over, she left the lab with the chief medic's shed tail in tow. She wanted to make sure no one would damage it in anyway. She knew that once Pururu had snapped out of it, she would want to keep her tail as a sort of memento. Kind of like saving the first tooth you lose.<p>

Once back into the safe haven of her room, she found her sister sat on her bed in tears.

"Ch-Chiroro! Chiroro!" she cried as she somehow launched herself all the way from the bed to her sister and catching her in a bear hug.

"I'm s-so sorry f-for yelling at you a-and being mean to you b-before… i-it was uncalled for… can you f-forgive me?" she spluttered, clinging to her sister as if letting her go would cause her to evaporate into thin air.

"It's alright, Karara" she found herself saying, despite the fact that she was still pretty hurt by it all.

"L-look… I'll go get us some dinner… you stay here… o-ok?" Karara suggested.

Chiroro nodded, thankful that she would get to eat out of Pururu's line of fire.

After eating together, Chiroro withstood Karara's onslaught of hugs and apologies before suggesting that getting an early night would be a good idea. She gently tucked Pururu's tail between the folds of a napkin she had saved from dinner and sat it on her bedside table, before curling up on her bed to finally get some shut eye.

She could have sworn she heard Karara ask her something, but she was unconscious before she could register and properly answer it.

**A/N**

**This chapter is so short and crap and stupid and GHEY. I actually had it written up yesterday, but couldn't find the motivation to type it up. This took so long to type up and edit and it still sucks ass, so for that I apologise XD This chapter was actually the second idea I had for this story (my story planning comes to me in little scenarios when I least expect it XD) and it did seem much longer in my head, so I was forced to use one of my back up plot devices (Pururu growing old) to make the chapter longer than 1000 words XD (its only about 2700 words now D'X)**

**I am aware that earth tadpole's tails don't just fall off when they metamorphosise, but this is one of my keronian head canons so I decided to go with it anyway XD**

**I know exactly what's gonna happen next chapter (it was my third idea for the story. The first idea will ironically be in one of the last chapters XD) so I shouldn't have too much trouble writing it up, but don't get ur hopes up XD**

**Long A/N is long XD**


	5. Chapter 5

Chiroro was awoken the next day by her sister muttering unintelligibly to herself, which either meant she was sleep talking or brainstorming. Sometimes both.

Cracking one eye open, she let a slight smile spread onto her face when she was met with the sight of her sister staring into her lap in deep thought. She was probably planning a course of action for winning over...

The smile was quickly dropped.

"Chi-ro-ro!" Karara called playfully, spotting Chiroro's open eyes, but seemingly oblivious to her displeased frown.

"Eh... morning, sis." Chiroro mumbled, sitting up and stretching, a slight frown still visible on her face. Finally sensing the atmosphere, Karara tilted her head curiously.

"Bad dream?"

"Huh? Oh, no." Chiroro replied "...I wish..." she added under her breath.

Getting out of bed, she stared exasperatedly at her sister's expectant gaze.

"...What?" she asked, already knowing the answer.

"Well, I was just waiting for you to wake up properly and stuff so I can explain my cunning ploy!" Karara smiled, doing a small fist pump. An action that would usually cause her sister to laugh, but today, she certainly wasn't in the mood.

"Karara..." She began, wondering how to word her next sentence.

"Yeah?" Karara asked, titling her head in the opposite direction to last time.

Chiroro looked at her sister's impatient face, before lowering her head slightly and sighing.

"N...not today..." she mumbled, biting her lip slightly and raising her eyes to meet her sister's.

"Not today... what?" She asked, confused. Chiroro resisted the urge to face palm at her dim-witted response.

"I don't want to help with this one..." Chiroro admitted, feeling bad but strangely satisfied for saying it.

Karara's expression darkened a lot more than Chiroro had expected it to, and she took a very slight step backwards.

"...What?" She asked darkly, giving Chiroro a chance to change her mind, and she very nearly did. However, she decided to listen to Tororo's advice and stick to her guns.

"I said I'm not helping you chase after Tororo" She said, more firmly this time, finally raising her head back up to stare her sister down, which turned out to be a rather hard task for her.

"Why?" Karara asked, her voice getting gradually louder. Chiroro swallowed. Karara only gave one word answers when she was either confused or angry, and she certainly wasn't the former. She looked even madder than the time she fought Tamama for Keroro's heart. She couldn't quite understand why her sister was suddenly so worked up, and she had no idea how to answer her question.

"Why, Chiroro?" Karara pressed, taking a slow, threatening step towards her. Chiroro refused to show how intimidated she felt and stood her ground.

"I'm done being your assistant, chasing after guys you don't even truly care about. You're my older twin, not my oppressor!" she spat, regretting it before she'd even finished speaking. However, Karara didn't react angrily; rather, she folded her arms and gave her a quizzical look.

"You've helped me every other time. Why is it only now that you've decided to abandon me?" Karara asked, making it sound much worse than it was, as usual. "Don't you care about my feelings anymore?"

"I don't know whether it's hit you yet, sister, but I have feelings of my own!" Chiroro hissed angrily, taking her own lunging step towards her now very confused looking sister.

"What's that supposed to mean?" Karara asked cluelessly.

"I can't help you go after Tororo because... because..." Chiroro began confidently, before trailing off at the end, not sure she was brave enough to say the rest.

"Because?" Karara prompted, just wanting a straight answer from her torn looking sister.

"Because... because I love him!" she cried, her face reddening in anger and embarrassment. Karara only stared silently.

"So... you won't help me... because you love him?"

Chiroro nodded, close to tears. Karara knew the next thing she was going to say was stupid, but couldn't seem to stop herself

"... I called... dibs?"

SMACK!

Karara staggered backwards, putting her hand to her stinging cheek, not really able to comprehend what just happened. Her sister had to be one of the friendliest people ever, she would never hurt a fly... had she really just slapped her? Staring at Chiroro in shock, she couldn't seem to find words to speak with.

"I pour my _heart_ out to you..." Chiroro whispered, tears stinging her eyes "...and that is how you react?"

"You hit me." Karara replied in a stunned monotone. Chiroro laughed sadly.

"You aren't capable of love, Karara. You wouldn't know anything about how I feel right now." She said, before turning and leaving the room, making sure to grab Pururu's tail on the way out.

* * *

><p>Taruru was jolted awake suddenly. He could have sworn he had heard a smack from across the hall. It was only very faint, but he had heard it all the same. Getting up from bed, he rubbed his tired eyes before leaving his room. He was going to call out and ask if whoever made the sound was okay, when the door to the twins' room was violently opened and a tearful Chiroro stalked out. She marched right past him, prompting concern from the blue frog.<p>

"Chiroro, are you okay?" he called, not surprised when he didn't receive a response. He decided to check on Karara, to see if she was okay. He made his way up to the door and knocked lightly.

"Karara? Can I come in?" he asked. Receiving no reply, he entered anyway – he wasn't just going to leave her in there.

Karara was curled up on her bed, her hand against her cheek, which had gone very red. It wasn't hard for Taruru to put two and two together. He closed the door behind him quietly and went to sit with Karara on the bed in silence for a few moments.

"She hit you." He stated eventually, almost hoping that Karara would deny it. Chiroro was a lovable girl, she'd never dream of hurting anyone or anything. He couldn't imagine why she would even _think_ of laying a hand on her beloved sister.

Karara only nodded, silent tears rolling down her face.

Taruru pulled her into a tight embrace, stroking her back to soothe her. He didn't bother asking if she wanted to talk about it, she usually didn't want to.

"It's my fault" She whispered suddenly, contradicting his current thoughts.

"What exactly happened?" He asked, leaning his head on hers as she buried her face into his chest, his eyes looking around the room absentmindedly as if searching for evidence.

"Well... she refused to help me go after Tororo... I got angry and questioned her, and then she admitted she was in love with him..."

Taruru's eyes widened in mild surprise, but he didn't say anything. He wanted to hear the rest of Karara's explanation.

"Then I... I told her I had _dibs_! Why did I _do_ that, Taruru?!" she cried, sobbing into his chest as she let out muffled curses at her stupidity.

"So that's why she slapped you." Taruru confirmed, feeling Karara's responding nod.

"She told me I wasn't capable of love, and she's right. I just blindly chase after guys that do even just one nice thing for me... I don't know what it means to love someone at all!" She whispered shakily.

Taruru shook his head and pushed her off of him so he could face her, smiling slightly.

"Karara, you're sixteen, you don't have to know any of that stuff yet." He said gently. Karara reached up and touched the hand gripping lightly to her shoulder, sniffing slightly, but appearing to calm down.

"What about Chiroro, then?" She asked suddenly ""Are her feelings... real?"

Taruru looked up thoughtfully.

"I can't answer that. Heck, I'm a little surprised myself. I thought she might, er... 'play for the other team', as it were"

Karara gave Taruru an odd look and raised an eye ridge.

"You thought she liked _girls_?" She asked, a disbelieving, but amused grin appearing on her face.

"L-let's not drift off topic here, shall we?" He asked, his face reddening in embarrassment. "In all seriousness, Chiroro's feelings may well be real and true. She's normally never interested in guys or whatever, and if she managed to work up the courage to say no to you, even _hit_ you, she's obviously serious about how she feels, don't you think?"

Karara nodded, not wanting to say more on the matter.

"...I'm going tell her you thought she was a lesbian" She smirked.

"Noooo don't!"

* * *

><p>Chiroro sat at the empty dining table, staring into space. She had stopped crying, but her eye's were still wet, and rather red.<p>

She couldn't believe she had hit her sister. Her best friend, her constant, and in what felt like a lapse of sanity, she had _hit _her. She still felt the sting in her palm.

She barely even remembered why she had even done it in the first place. She just remembered confessing her love for Tororo and then... something.

At that thought, the salmon recruit entered the room.

"Mornin' Chiroro" he mumbled tiredly, rubbing sleep from his eyes why shuffling his way into the kitchen, on his routine course straight to the fridge. Chiroro didn't reply, just continued staring ahead blankly.

Tororo noticed her vacant look, and after compiling his stupidly large breakfast, took a seat directly opposite her and in her line of sight. Chiroro didn't react.

"...Chiroro? Are you alright?" he asked, raising his voice slightly in a bid to bring her out of her daze.

The yellow tadpole suddenly snapped to attention.

"What? Oh, yes... I'm fine" she replied.

"You don't look it" he replied, referring to her flushed face, which was still a little damp. Not receiving a reply, he pushed over one of the plates that orbited his giant breakfast, covered in about ten slices of toast.

"Eat" he said simply.

Chiroro glanced at the absurd amount of toast on her plate and nodded slightly, grabbing a slice and taking a bite out of it.

"Want a drink?" Tororo asked in a way that said she was going to get one whatever her reply was.

Chiroro nodded again before continuing to devour her toast.

Fetching a glass of water from the kitchen, Tororo came and sat beside her, dragging his breakfast over to him from the other side of the table.

"Here." He said, passing the glass to her. He felt a little awkward about the whole thing... this was the first time he'd paid any attention to Chiroro, rather than it being the other way around. Plus, its not as if he was actually any good at comforting people.

"So... what happened?" he asked.

"You don't have to try to comfort me" Chiroro mumbled. Tororo shook his head, a lopsided grin forming on his face.

"Now you _know_ saying stuff like that just makes me want to try harder!" he chuckled.

Chiroro smiled slightly before returning to a frown, remembering what had happened earlier.

"Long story short, I said no to her and we argued. I don't really want to go into it..." she explained lamely. Her heart fluttered slightly when Tororo beamed at her suddenly.

"Oh, good for you!" he said, feeling proud for some reason.

"I hit her." Chiroro added abruptly, trying not to start crying again "I got really upset and I hit her."

Tororo dropped his smile and gave her a confused look.

"It would make a hell of a lot more sense if I actually explained it properly... but I don't want to talk about it..."

Tororo only nodded, making it hard to tell what he thought of it all.

"What are you doing today?" he asked, seemingly out of the blue.

"Oh? Nothing... why?" Chiroro replied

"Just wondered if you wanted to hang out or something" he asked awkwardly, looking away and pursing his lips in an odd way.

Chiroro raised an eye ridge in confusion, but nodded with a shy smile. She knew that he was only offering because he knew she didn't want to see her sister, but that in itself was sweet.

* * *

><p>"K-Karara... did you honestly learn nothing?" Taruru asked in disbelief as Karara snuck up to Tororo's room. Taruru had been following behind her the whole time, trying to convince her to stop what she was doing, to no avail.<p>

"Of course I learned something. This... if Chiroro really does love Tororo, she'll have to prove it... by fighting me for him!" She smiled proudly, mind clearly set on her little theory.

"What kind of logic is that?! Karara, please!" Taruru questioned, practically begging now.

"No, Taruru, I'm gonna do this" She pressed.

Taruru said nothing and hung his head sadly. Not getting the gesture, Karara made her way to Tororo's door, found it unlocked, and promptly barged right in. Once inside, she was instantly met with the sight of both Tororo and Chiroro both staring intently at the chubby hacker's computer monitor, the salmon tadpole teaching the yellow one something or other to do with publishing software. They turned around almost simultaneously at the sound of the door opening, Chiroro guiltily shying away as soon as she realised it was her sister, even though she didn't look bruised or even upset in the slightest.

"Tororo!" Karara cried, pointing at said tadpole with a determined look in her eyes.

"Karara..." he started.

"I have come to win you over!" She stated proudly. Outside the door, Taruru face palmed and groaned.

Tororo thought carefully before saying anything.

"For what?" he finally asked cryptically. Karara gave him a confused look.

"Huh?"

Tororo smirked and came towards her.

"How much would you freak out if I... returned your feelings..." he began quietly, before leaning both his arms on the wall either side of Karara's head and leaned his face dangerously close to hers "...and tried to get... physical with you?" he finished, his grin widening as he watched her visibly pale.

"A-a lot" She replied quickly, letting out a breath of relief when Tororo pushed away from the wall and backing away to give her space.

"Then what exactly is the point of it all?" he asked, raising an eye ridge in question. Chiroro briefly wondered if he had rehearsed this in preparation for this very moment, but he looked so terribly awkward that she decided he was just doing a good job of improvising. Meanwhile, Karara looked just as bewildered as ever.

Tororo turned and sat back down next to Chiroro.

"This is the advice bit, you're on your own" He whispered to her with a grin. Chiroro only rolled her eyes at him and swivelled round in her chair, something she found more fun than it should be.

"You don't have to chase random dudes around, you know. If you just _thought_ about it for once, you'd see what I'm getting at"

Karara frowned, not liking how cryptic this conversation was to her.

"The answer is right in front of you" Chiroro added before doing a shooing motion with her hand, enjoying the look on her sisters face as she shook her head and left the room in confusion. A short silence enveloped the room, the sound of Karara and Taruru walking down the hall becoming the only sound before it slowly petered away. Chiroro shot an unimpressed look in Tororo's direction.

"What? She's your sister, and I didn't particularly want to play love councillor again." He said, thinking back to that time in the hallway with Taruru.

"Again?" Chiroro asked, an amused expression on her face.

"Long story..." he said, frowning slightly. "Anyway, I did _try_ to help out a little. It's the thought that counts." He added, referring to how he had tried comforting her all day.

"That's right. Thanks Tororo, you were great today" Chiroro smiled at him and pulled him into a hug before she could stop herself. Though he stiffened in her embrace, he still managed to shyly return the gesture, his face flushed red.

* * *

><p>Tororo had a medical check up later that day. Pururu had decided to put her 'tragedy' behind her and just do her job. Tororo still gave her the tail that he had taken from Chiroro, causing the lilac frog to become tearful for a little while before putting the precious final symbol of youth somewhere safe.<p>

"S-so... Tororo..." Pururu began intent on moving forward "Anything going on with you that you'd like to talk about?"

Tororo thought to himself for a brief moment.

"Not really. I'm trying to be nicer and more helpful to people like I said I would, but it's really hard" he admitted. Pururu chuckled a little.

"I heard about the advice you gave Taruru and the advice you _almost_ gave to Karara. You should become an agony... uncle"

"Oh screw you" Tororo huffed, frowning embarrassedly "It was agony just trying to _say_ it all"

Pururu smiled and jotted something down on her pad.

"The fact that you put that much effort into it is remarkable... are you trying to impress someone?" she asked.

"Impress someone? What, like I'd get a merit from the boss for being a good boy? Should I start eating vegetables next?" Tororo answered sarcastically.

"I didn't mean that... I meant _impress_ someone" Pururu emphasised.

"Just tell me what you're thinking already" Tororo grumbled impatiently.

"Like... a _girl_?" Pururu tried again.

Tororo recoiled slightly, his face red, to Pururu's utter amusement.

"What are you insinuating, Medic? Chiroro is a _friend_!" he spat defensively.

"I never said anything about Chiroro" Pururu reminded him, weaving her fingers together and leaning her head on them, grinning big.

Tororo was about to mention that the only other girls on the ship were a basket case and a pensioner, but he didn't feel like dying today, so he just left the room in an embarrassed huff.

"Oh, and Tororo? Leader told me to tell you to set the ship's coordinates to Pokopen for tomorrow. We're picking up the Keroro platoon to assist us on part of the mission" Pururu called after him.

"Argh, fuck that!" Tororo growled aloud to no one in particular.

"Fuck what?" Chiroro asked, popping up from around the corner, nearly giving the chubby hacker a heart attack.

Holy... Chiroro!" he cried, as Chiroro laughed at his reaction.

"Just thought I'd come find you and say goodnight, 'cause I'm going to bed soon" she said, falling into step with him.

"Oh... really? Well... goodnight, then" Tororo replied, surprised but oddly touched by the gesture.

"Oh... and I'm sorry for randomly hugging you earlier... I know you have issues with personal space" Chiroro added, causing Tororo to blush.

"I do not! I... well, maybe..."

Chiroro only smiled again before walking closer by Tororo.

"The most ironic thing just happened" She said quietly.

"Oh?" Tororo asked, his interest piqued.

"Karara told me she thinks she loves Taruru... like, properly loves him... but she's too shy to tell him" Chiroro explained rolling her eyes with a smirk.

"My god, you're joking!" Tororo said, both eye ridges raised in utter disbelief.

"I wish I was. God, I just want to bang their stupid heads together. Taruru's had a blatant crush on her forever." Chiroro sighed, shaking her head. Tororo suddenly let out an involuntary yawn.

"I'm sorry Chiroro, but as _riveting _as this conversation has been, I really need to turn in... today just felt like a chapter in a cheesy romance novel" He apologised, turning round the corner leading in the direction of his room.

"Alright. You've done very well" Chiroro joked "Goodnight, Tororo"

"You too..." he replied, before they finally went their separate ways.

**A/N**

**Unnecessarily dramatic chapter is unnecessary. This chapter was awkward as hell to hell to type up because I hate it XD There we go, another one of the first ideas I had for this story... thought I think it was originally meant to be Karara that slapped Chiroro... but I think I made her psychopathic enough for this chapter XD**

**This chapter has been written up for about a month, just never typed... don't hurt me XD**

**The chapter after this has been started, but I'm still trying to figure out where this will go. Lots of crazy stuff happened, and I've been distracted. But I promise to finish this. I don't like the idea of having an unfinished story on my page XD**

**That's all for now... enjoy? :3**

**((oh Ps, I do actually have a finished ToroChiro smut as a final experiment to see if I really was asexual... which I am, so it's quite pitiful XD I'm only adding this because I think someone asked me to do a smut of this couple a while back... do you still want me to post it? If I recieve genuine interest in it for some terrifying reason, I might just type it up XP))**


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